Hi all

Have been building my a1200 tower. Have issue with blizzard 030 and buffered IDE interface. If 030 is connected A1200 will not post and flashes power light. Any ideas

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A1200 ACA1232 128MB Indivison MkIICr
Elbox empty Power Tower
RPi3 Emulating C64 ZX Atari PS BBC
Wii with Amiga emulation
Vampire v4 SA

@g01df1sh


I have problems with my tower on what feels a three month cycle. Posted this yesterday.

http://www.scuzzscink.com/amiga/scuzzblog_august17/scuzzblogdaugust17_1001.htm

I have no idea what your issue is. I am assuming you set up IDEFix and all that . My 1200 works with the buffered interface and the Blizzard 1230IV and two IDE hard drives, ZIP and CD-ROM. Assume everything is connected to the correct channels etc. I just refer to my nifty document that came with the disk. Also have the help me files from EyeTech. Must post them sometimes.

Good luck.

scuzz
http://www.scuzzscink.com/amiga/a_amiga_inframe.htm

@g01df1sh

As I said in another post, I never got any buffered IDE interface to work with my A1200.

If you remove the 030, can you still boot from a HDD attached to the buffered inteface?

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AmigaOne X5000 P5020 2Ghz, OS 4.1
AmigaOne XE G4 800mhz, OS 4.1
A1200T 40Mhz 68040, OS 3.9

@daveyw

Seems odd... This was my days fun with a cardboard Amiga which I still have in its Pizza box somewhere. [ a bit bugger than a pizza box ]

http://www.scuzzscink.com/amiga/amiga_scuzz185.htm

http://www.scuzzscink.com/amiga/a_scuzz_jan05/a_scuzz_feb12_06.jpg

With my guide for IDEfix97 from those wonderful folk at Elaborite Bytes they give a series of wonderful diagrams regarding setting up the channels and what to connect to what. Run the software and it will detect all the kit. I have quite a few of these interfaces. I even have one running in an A2000 with a 1200 motherboard inside.

http://www.scuzzscink.com/amiga/amiga_scuzz222.htm

http://www.scuzzscink.com/amiga/a_scuzz_jul2005/a_scuzz_jul30_173.jpg

Another cardboard box. Seems to work. I use this computer to back up hard drives so being able tp swap out all the time is essential.

Like I say the trick is in running the software. I also have a key which I bought so I don't get the annoying popup.

PS That original was running with an Apollo 060 but I did swap it out also for the Blizzard 1230IV which is my preferred weapon of choice.

scuzz
http://www.scuzzscink.com/amiga/a_amiga_inframe.htm

Last edited by scuzz on 12-Aug-2017 at 11:16 AM.
Last edited by scuzz on 12-Aug-2017 at 11:15 AM.

@scuzz

Nice project! I get tempted to fiddle with my A1200, but I vowed not to spend any more time or effort on it and stick to my NextGen Amigas (A1XE and now X5000).

I don't know what the issue was. This is about 20 years ago, so my memory is hazy... I also tried a scandoubler that also didn't work (or I think it worked with 3.0 but not 3.1?).

I suspect there are major incompatibilites between different MB revisions, which devs are either unaware or or just ignore.

Anyway, in the end I managed to get the scsi kit for my Blizzard, and expanded that way, which turned out to be a far better option. The downside is, with no IDE drive attached it takes ages to boot up (and then softkick 3.9).

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AmigaOne X5000 P5020 2Ghz, OS 4.1
AmigaOne XE G4 800mhz, OS 4.1
A1200T 40Mhz 68040, OS 3.9

@daveyw
Hi

I must confess I prefer the SCSIKIT on the Blizzard albeit the one SCSI drive is a bit flaky these days. I have to switch on the ZIP, CDROM and two hard drives and they do kinda make a bit of noise. The top drive throws up an unexpected phase shift or what ever its called and will not be visible after boot. I have my mount list off the echo so I can see what is going down. As ever I just tap the box and she spins up.

On the tower I had a sticky IDE. I installed something called slow boot which helped a lot.

I have uploaded some documentation on IDEFix plus the buffered interface tonight which some may find useful. The issue was always getting the right combination of drives working with the correct ports or channels. Also the software auto detected and that was a help. never really had an issue.

The Apollo060 was a pig with the PCMCIA and power. Whereas the Blizzard was never a problem. Those wonderful blue streaks at boot... such a comfort.

http://www.scuzzscink.com/amiga/scuzzblog_august17/scuzzblogdaugust17_1201.htm


scuzz
http://www.scuzzscink.com/amiga/a_amiga_inframe.htm

@g01df1sh

You don't mention any drives so is this crash also with no drives attached?

I don't know if it relates but I had a similar issue with my A400D. I didn't use any buffered interface, just the internal IDE by itself. I connected a DVD drive and set it as master. One drive on one cable to one port. Simple enough to work. But it kept crashing on boot. I don't know why it did but IIRC I set the drive to slave even though it had no master and then it booted fine. Bizarre!

The A4000D has since had a HD attached as a master for years now so I feel better about it.

@daveyw

Quote:

The downside is, with no IDE drive attached it takes ages to boot up

You need one of those IDE adaptors. I forget what they are called. Nothing turned up online. You plug it onto the IDE port and it fools the Amiga into thinking a drive is there. Essentially it contains a resistor IIRC that trips up the Kickstart in the drive wait code to think a device is connected so doesn't delay the boot.

Without an IDE disk attached or one of these adaptors it makes it unbearable having to wait. With double reboot one minute is gone from your life. And it's worse if you are trying to diagnose a fault.